Martin Scanlan's "Dig"

wow... that's beautiful. Her skin when she leaned into the window on that one shot is just fantastic, the way the highlights worked. All the stuff in the cafe including the final push in was really stunning. I also couldn't believe her skin tones on the street with the blue light post, how still pink in that light. Great grading. I thought the variety from the bar stuff to the exteriors really showed the breath of it. That's really something.

I thought the casting was really great, and that last moment particularly moving.

I'm glad I downloaded it and would recommend to do so to see it.
 
To prove my point watch this and compare side by side... https://vimeo.com/16898584

Thats shot with the F3 in 10bit 4:2:2

I'd be hard pressed to see anything different between these two in terms of quality from the Vimeo 1080p files.


I think sometimes people see what they want to see. Someone tells you "hey this looks great, it was 4K bounced to 1080" and you think... oh it must be good. Then someone says, "hey this looks ok for 1080 but not what 4K would be" and then you think... hmm maybe it could be better.

I put those to shorts side by side on vimeo and played them back. I see no difference in image quality in a 1080p situation. Will their be a big difference in 4K? most likely, but if you're finishing to 1080, and especially to TV only situations, I'm pretty sure the F3 has got much more bang for the buck right now.

If you wanna do feature work, big screen work/big screen ads "movie theater ads" and such then The F55 in 4K might be the better option. Dont let your eyes fool you. I'm a super pixel peeper and I'm watching both of these back and finding a hard time to tell the difference in the QUALITY of the image over one another. Vimeo is still Vimeo, until you get some raw files to check out, there's just no real telling.

I agree with you for the most part, Dude. Convergence was also pre s-log and you can tell in the daytime highlights...not a knock on the film or anything but with s-log the rollof would be better and we would likely have more shadow detail. F3 is a great bang for buck only when coupled with an external recorder.
 
IF you can't tell a very base difference (And rather significant) between the base quality of what you linked and DIG, as far as JUST the core image, then I'm not sure you're a super pixel peeper =]

From a Hyper-Peeper, here.

Nowhere near close at its core, and I'd likely be willing to wager that side by side the F3 and F55 differences will be easy to spot ou tof hte same shots.
 
I think sometimes people see what they want to see.

This is absolutely true, and I have enough experience with clients in edit and color sessions to know it. That said,

I also see a very small amount of finer detail in the 55 1080p material. I could not fault someone if they do not see it. To me it's the difference between the F3 and the Alexa. It's so small it's almost not worth talking about, and it certainly doesn't play in the bigger picture of what camera to use for what purpose. I couldn't have come to the conclusion without 1, seeing live 1080p from the camera in person, and 2, downloading Dig's original 1080p upload. But it's nice, and I like it. One step closer to the Alexa, which is my personal benchmark.

I did however see, with the cameras in front of me and a 4K monitor to look at, quite a bit of something that I had never seen before, a 4K live image. It was pretty cool. It made more of an impression on me than the one or two times I've seen Red 4K projections, or pixel peeping my own full res Red footage. The 55 looked more detailed, but I don't know if it actually was.

As far as I'm concerned, if the 5/55 fixes the practical use problems of the F3, plus has an arguable extra stop of latitude and something approaching 4K res for 2-3 years into the future when clients *might* start asking about delivering in 4K, then I'm good to go with a 5 or 55 camera. I myself don't need mega-resolution or 15 stops to make the jump.
 
As far as I'm concerned, if the 5/55 fixes the practical use problems of the F3, plus has an arguable extra stop of latitude and something approaching 4K res for 2-3 years into the future when clients *might* start asking about delivering in 4K, then I'm good to go with a 5 or 55 camera. I myself don't need mega-resolution or 15 stops to make the jump.

Well said, I'm totally with you on this. :)
 
oh and I'm not knocking the F55, I'm just saying simply I think people need to realize you can't be judging a camera on its 4K abilities and dynamic range, and quality from a highly compressed, then recompressed image streaming on a website when bounced down to 1080p.

It's like when I get clients who say to me... oh can the canon 5D match with my Scarlet... And I'm like... NO it will not match. Then they tell me," oh but I see stuff on youtube"... And I tell them, I'm shooting for the big screen or at least HDTV, not youtube. Internet is no way to really judge, only to download and view the footage properly. Does the F55 footage look nice? Hell yeah, but does the footage jump out and scream, WOW thats some great 4K footage bounced down to 1080! with AMAZING dynamic range, and all of that jazz... nope. But then again when I see it on the big screen I may say differently. I would have loved to see an ungraded version. I think the grade was a little too strong for my liking, I would have liked something a bit more organic feeling I guess. Could also be a color shift from export, who knows.

Watch the latest tests with the shootout with Zacuto and you'll see that people often see what they want to see. They also get the cameras really wrong at times too.
 
I think these new F cameras will be great from a user perspective. Image quality is pretty much up to how you use the camera on this level. Just as the F3 is very similar to Alexa in many respects the F5-55 will probably look just as good.
 
So instead of buying filmstocks, people will rent the appropriate camera.
This means that the job of the DP is even more to know how to work with a VARIETY of cameras today rather than just the principles of operating.

Just want to point out that the palette of colors does seems to hold very well.
The purples in the bar scenes were really welled contained and that is something I have only seen the F65 do well up to this point.

I do think there is added detail and that the SLOG style of roll-off is marrying very well with it. That's what I see.

The only other thing that I would suggest is that the choice of glass is definitely in play here. The Cookes are really cutting away some of the video edge as well.

All in all the F55 feels great. I will keep it in mind for the appropriate projects. Nice to have a new film stock to chose from.
 
Scanners286 Quote: As for the Alexa comparisons, at this level cameras are almost becoming like film stocks, you use the one you like the look of. I think it's up there technically, but the choice is going to come down to the piece and the filmmakers.


Well yes......But switching to another can of film and upgrading your image that way was and still is a damn sight cheaper than buying a new camera every two years.
Ok, that's just me missing the days when all of my shoots were on film, rather than the few I've shot this past year. But think about it, with film the same camera lasted decades and was as up to date as the latest Kodak / Fuji stock that you stuffed the mags with.
Oh well......
 
4K please? Bit torrent maybe? Still frames, at least?

The logistics of this are slightly daunting, but a shot or two would be pretty cool.

I wonder if Martin even has in his hands a 4K version. I doubt it. Even if he does, I'd suspect it's just a pile of DPX frames.
 
Would love to have seen int. Codec version ungraded just for s*%ts and giggles.

As I understand it, they shot raw and had to have a unreleased version of Resolve to make offlines and finish.

It's possible to output a "flat pass" in Resolve, but unless they went out of their way, a flat version probably doesn't exist. Just offline transcodes would be my guess, and they'd be compromised.
 
Scanners286 Quote: As for the Alexa comparisons, at this level cameras are almost becoming like film stocks, you use the one you like the look of. I think it's up there technically, but the choice is going to come down to the piece and the filmmakers.


Well yes......But switching to another can of film and upgrading your image that way was and still is a damn sight cheaper than buying a new camera every two years.
Ok, that's just me missing the days when all of my shoots were on film, rather than the few I've shot this past year. But think about it, with film the same camera lasted decades and was as up to date as the latest Kodak / Fuji stock that you stuffed the mags with.
Oh well......
Still photography had this for a decade now, go talk to some people who shoot medium format digital, their sensors cost in the $20~45k range and there's also always something new every couple of years. Also the D800, which despite being a $3000, 35mm camera, is already at the heels of lower-end MF sensors... That's good enough for 95% of people even within the high-end sector.

I'm surprised the video world has managed to cling on to film for so long as it has.
 
Scanners286 Quote: As for the Alexa comparisons, at this level cameras are almost becoming like film stocks, you use the one you like the look of. I think it's up there technically, but the choice is going to come down to the piece and the filmmakers.


Well yes......But switching to another can of film and upgrading your image that way was and still is a damn sight cheaper than buying a new camera every two years.
Ok, that's just me missing the days when all of my shoots were on film, rather than the few I've shot this past year. But think about it, with film the same camera lasted decades and was as up to date as the latest Kodak / Fuji stock that you stuffed the mags with.
Oh well......

No, you dont buy different cameras in this paradigm. You rent them. Only rental houses have enough turnaround these days. Right camera for the right job. If it's not paid off within 2 years of purchase, it never will be. This is as it was. I never had enough money to purchase an Arri 435 or an Aaton Minima, I rented them, along with the lenses. Right camera for the right job. But I still had to buy film stock, pay lab fees and later the cost of a DI. What do I have to purchase today, really?

A hard drive.
 
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